


Love at First Fall

by jingsino



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Light-Hearted, Romance, why is cousland in a tree? nobody knows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-12
Updated: 2015-04-12
Packaged: 2018-03-22 14:44:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3732781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jingsino/pseuds/jingsino
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elissa Cousland's in a tree. Alistair wants to fix that.</p>
<p>Hopefully, there's a lesson somewhere.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love at First Fall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [corktree](https://archiveofourown.org/users/corktree/gifts).



> pure fluff at an unspecificed date, based on her glorious prompt:
>
>> PERSON A IS STUCK IN A TREE AND PERSON B HAS TO HELP THEM DOWN BUT PERSON A FALLS ON PERSON B AND TENSION THEN KISS!!!

“Hey! What are you doing up there?”

Elissa Cousland squinted at the small figure beneath her branch of safety, and immediately regretted it. He seemed a mile away, but she knew that man anywhere. She had heard his voice a thousand times, all of his stupid, awful jokes, fought back to back in the heat of battle with him.

“Alistair,” she whispered, then slumped against the trunk of the tree. Great. Now he was a firsthand witness to her shame and humiliation. She ran a hand through her hair, already anticipating the slew of jokes he would crack back at camp.

As if he heard her, Alistair shouted back, “Elissa! Wait there, I'll get you!”

She snapped to attention and looked for Alistair. Laughter bubbled from her throat when she saw him. He hugged the tree and attempted to worm his way up, practically grinding against the bark like a beast marking its territory. His arm reach toward the sky, toward her, in a fruitless effort to save her.

“Hm? Is that...?”

Elissa peered down at the new voice. Another figure, with dark hair, doubled over in laughter—shit was that Morrigan? She dared to lean just a bit closer. Feathery clothes, obvious amusement at Alistair's actions.

Yeah, that was her.

“It seems Alistair has more in common with the dog than I predicted. For whatever reason is he harassing this tree, hmm?” Her bright eyes, still twinkling with mirth, wandered up and spotted Elissa.

Elissa waved.

“Ah.”

Alistair dropped three feet from the trunk to the ground, spinning around to glare at Morrigan. “I—”

“I can get her,” she said shortly. 

She spread her arms and closed her eyes, halfway through the transformation before Alistair yelled, “Stop!”

“What?!” she snapped.

He scratched the back of his neck. “I'm going to get her.” His face contorted into an out of place scowl. “Not you.”

Morrigan eyed him with a tilt of her head. She acquiesced with a sigh and spared a merciful glance in Elissa's direction. “My apologies, but he insisted,” she called to her.

Elissa buried her face in her hands. “Thanks Morrigan,” she mumbled.

As Morrigan ambled away, Alistair turned back to the tree. He gazed up at Elissa's form, clear as day in the empty branches, and blew the air from his lungs.

“You're, uh, you're pretty high up there, Elissa,” he started. “What branch is that, fifth, sixth?”

She stared at him through the space between her fingers.

“Silence, okay, I can work with that.” The blond clapped his hands together, then cupped them around his mouth. “Listen! I'm going to get you down from there! I'm going to save you if it's the last thing I do!” He waved both hands and grinned, like everything was okay, like he was a golden prince rescuing her, the fucking Grey Warden of Grey Wardens.

Her heart did a little flip. Blood rushed to her face, heating her cheeks despite the cool weather. She shivered, wondering if she should have worn a sweater, and removed her hands from her face to wrap them around herself.

Alistair pursed his mouth in a thin line and paced around the base of the tree. He stumbled on the roots at least twice and cursed while frantically trying to cover it up as a slick move. Stopping in his tracks, he searched for her among the trees.

When his eyes met hers, he put on what he hoped was his best dashing smile on and declared, once more, “Watch out, Cousland! I'm going to save you!”

Elissa beamed back, in spite of herself. The hammering in her chest grew faster. “Okay,” she whispered.

Alistair cocked his head to the side. “What?”

“Okay,” she repeated, louder.

He laughed. “What, Cousland?”

She laughed with him. “Okay!”

Alistair's heart swelled. He was going to save her. He was going to save Elissa Cousland, strong, fierce, Elissa Cousland who probably didn't need him at all but stayed with him anyway. Elissa, who accepted him, accepted his faults and shortcomings and wanted to help him become a better person. Elissa. Alistair gazed at her fondly, vaguely aware that he felt rather warm from his head to his toes.

He was going to save the woman he loved.

The thought was sudden, striking and splitting him like lightning on a tree. The faint warmth thrumming through his veins grew warmer, set off by the light in his heart. He wanted to be a better person, someone who deserved to love her, someone who deserved to be loved by her. And he was going to start here.

Alistair rolled his shoulders. “Elissa? Can you go down a few branches?”

She opened her mouth, then shut it, replacing it with a soft smile as she pushed herself off her safety branch. For a moment, she thought she was going to fall, but the solid branch underneath her proved stable. She gave Alistair a thumbs up and grinned.

Alistair spread his arms. “Okay now jump!”

Elissa choked. “What? Wait, what?”

“I'll catch you! Don't worry!”

“No! Maker, why?!”

“Okay, fine, go down another branch!”

“...It's still high up!”

“Just jump, okay? If you want to slay an archdemon, you're going to have to do this first!”

Elissa massaged her temples and began to pray. “And there I saw the Black City, its towers forever stain'd, its gates—”

“Elissa!”

She chanted louder. “Its gates forever shut! Heaven has been filled with silence!”

Alistair groaned. “I swear I will catch you! I swear it!”

A heavy silence settled in the chill air, until he heard her soft, “I trust you.”

And then she jumped and Alistair screamed, “You should have given me a warning first!” He prayed that he would catch her, but at the end of those terrifying, probably not well thought out few seconds, he knew he would catch her. He knew it, because he couldn't imagine living a life without Elissa Cousland, would not allow it if he had a say.

She landed not so much in his arms as on his entire body. The air was knocked from his lungs and his vision went dark, and for a moment he thought maybe he had died, and concluded that it wasn't so bad as long Elissa was okay. But when he felt her on top of him, held her there in his arms, he knew this was much better. He blushed as she pulled away from him, realizing that yeah, actually, maybe this was too weird, maybe it would have been better if he died being crushed to death by Elissa Cousland's amazing ass.

“Geez, uh, sorry I couldn't catch you better,” he mumbled, staring at a spot next to her ear. Was that a magpie? How interesting!

Elissa suddenly decided that it was far more important to scratch the dirt from beneath her nails at the moment. “It's alright,” she said, more to her fingers than to him. “Sorry I landed on you like this.”

He chanced a glance just as her eyes darted up for a glimpse. They both seemed to realize that she was on top of him, straddling him, in a most inappropriate manner. Alistair squirmed the same time she attempted to slide off, leaving them both with redder faces than was necessary,

Alistair sat up and grabbed her arm as she fell back from the sudden movement. Elissa squeaked and coughed into her fist. Their current position wasn't as different as before; she was still sitting on his lap, and he was still trying to figure how his heroism turned into this.

“Okay, well...” he tried lamely. “I'm...glad you're, er, safe.”

Elissa stared at him strangely, mouth puckered to the side. She raised her hand, and he wondered if she was going to slap him. He would have let her. But then she threw her head back and laughed wonderfully, confusing him, elating him, stealing his breath away as he slowly joined her. 

She slapped his chest lightly as she calmed down. “I'm glad I'm safe, too.”

His cheeks hurt from grinning, but he found that he didn't mind when she held his face in her hands and pressed a chaste kiss to his forehead. He didn't doubt that she could feel his heart beating erratically, nor did he doubt that the warmth he felt wasn't entirely from himself. She was radiant. She was beautiful. Even when she wasn't made up, when she was covered in dirt and scars that few noblewomen could compare to, she was still Elissa Cousland, and that was enough—no, scratch that, more than enough.

He offered her a hand off the ground, which she slapped playfully away. At his childish pout, she rolled her eyes and grabbed it.

“Do I have anything on my face?” she asked.

Alistair briefly entertained the idea of saying, “You do now,” and kissing her right then and there, but pocketed it in favor of a harmless lie. She saw right through it, of course, and punched his shoulder with a huff.

He really did want to kiss her. But he was fine with what they had now. He didn't mind waiting for her, because from here on out, he would be ready for her every time.


End file.
